イスラム諸国記事

・・・Turkey is expected to impose sanctions soon on Syria, and it has deepened its support for an umbrella political opposition group known as the Syrian National Council, which announced its formation in Istanbul. But its harboring of leaders in the Free Syrian Army, a militia composed of defectors from the Syrian armed forces, may be its most striking challenge so far to Damascus. On Wednesday, the group, living in a heavily guarded refugee camp in Turkey, claimed responsibility for killing nine Syrian soldiers, including one uniformed officer, in an attack in restive central Syria.・・・ “We will fight the regime until it falls and build a new period of stability and safety in Syria,” Colonel As’aad said in an interview arranged by the Turkish Foreign Ministry and conducted in the presence of a Foreign Ministry official. “We are the leaders of the Syrian people and we stand with the Syrian people.” The interview was held in the office of a local government official, and Colonel As’aad arrived protected by a contingent of 10 heavily armed Turkish soldiers, including one sniper.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/28/world/europe/tur...

アラブ連盟もシリア批判を高めている。
米国の駐シリア大使はシリアを引き揚げた。↓

・・・Even other Arab dictators are embarrassed. The 22-member Arab League sent a delegation to see Mr. Assad on Wednesday. It demanded an end to the crackdown by Oct. 31 or else Syria might be thrown out of the league. It also wants Assad to agree to “the people’s demands.”・・・ Assad lost even more foreign support this week after a smear campaign in the state media against American Ambassador Robert Ford forced him to leave the country out of concern for his life.・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-v...

A Taliban suicide bomber has rammed an explosives-laden car into a bus carrying members of the International Security Assistance Force in the Afghan capital, Kabul, killing 17 people.・・・ The suicide attacker driving a red Toyota Corolla detonated the bomb just as the bus was passing・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-1550492...

・・・More than 10 months after it started with the suicide of a Tunisian fruit vendor, the great wave of insurrection across the Arab world has toppled three autocrats and led last week in Tunisia to an election that many hailed as the dawn of a new era. It has not yielded any clear political or economic project, or any intellectual standard-bearers of the kind who shaped almost every modern revolution from 1776 onward. In those revolts, thinkers or ideologues -- from Thomas Paine to Lenin to Mao to Vaclav Havel -- helped provide a unifying vision or became symbols of a people’s aspirations.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/sunday-review/th...

・・・ Almost two out of every three Arabs are under 30, a level exceeded only in sub-Saharan Africa. And the Middle East and North Africa boast both the highest youth unemployment and unemployment overall on the planet. ＜就職できない、就職しても低賃金、だから結婚もできない。↓＞ Years ago, political scientists, including Diane Singerman, began using the term "waithood" to describe the crippled outlook for the young generations of the Arab world. Unable to find jobs, or jobs that paid a living wage, millions of young Arabs were fated to live unhappily at home, unable to afford marriage. And in conservative Islamic societies, marriage for many is the only launch there is into independence, dignity, and a life of one's own. ・・・ Around the region this year -- in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen -- many, though not all, young protesters and fighters told me the same. "All of them, they had nothing to lose. They saw their life wasting away," Israa Khalil, a 25-year-old woman in Tripoli, said of her male friends and relatives. "So they all went to fight."・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/10/26/l...

シリアの体制派と反体制派の綱引きがターニングポイントに？
この後、どっちに振れるかはお立合い。↓

Syrian opposition leaders said President Bashar al-Assad's forces appear to have gained the upper hand in the eight-month revolt, after a weekend of one of the harshest crackdowns on protesters served another blow to a movement struggling to overcome divisions within its ranks.・・・ At one point, what we call the silent majority came to be aligned with the street protests at least from a humanitarian and moral point of view. But now they've stepped back again・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240529702037...

・・・With the surge in American forces this year, Taliban dominance of many areas in Afghanistan’s south has been ended, forcing them to find other ways to fight back, General Jacobson said. “We see less and less capability to actually face us,” he said, “so there’s an increased use of I.E.D.’s and assassinations, and we can call them spectacular attacks, attacks that are simply laid on to make it a big story in the media.”・・・ The Hotel Intercontinental was hit in June, followed by the British Council, a cultural relations agency, in August on Afghanistan’s Independence Day, the celebration of the end of British rule. In September, seven insurgents with sniper rifles, an 84-millimeter recoilless rifle and rocket-propelled grenades, among other weapons, attacked the American Embassy and the ISAF headquarters next door, using a perch in a hotel under construction and possibly pre-positioned ammunition caches. A week later, the former Afghan presidentBurhanuddin Rabbani was assassinated; he was the head of the High Peace Council, charged with reconciliation talks with the Taliban. On Thursday, another complex attack was launched in Kandahar on the Provincial Reconstruction Team, a largely American group that is helping to distribute aid money as part of the war effort. Afghan officials have placed blame for all of those save the Rabbani assassination directly on the Haqqanis.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/31/world/asia/haqqa...

トルコにおいてクルド問題が再先鋭化しつつあったまさにその時にクルド人地区で大地震が起こった。↓

＜以前とは違って、徴兵されたクルド兵をクルド地区に送り込むようになっていた。同族相撃をさせようってわけだ。↓＞ ・・・Some Kurdish nationalists and analysts claim that the government has chosen in recent years to deploy more Kurdish conscripts in their home region, where they are more likely to fight the P.K.K., in an attempt to prove the rebels are cold killers and to gain Kurds’ support. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/world/europe/kur...

＜大地震が起こった時、あるTVキャスターは、「この国の東部＜（クルト人地区）＞で起こったにもかかわらず、我々は遺憾には思う」と語って物議を醸した。↓＞ ・・・A newscaster on Turkey's popular Haberturk TV caused an outcry when she said backhandedly, "Even though this earthquake happened in Van, in the east of the country, we're still sorry."・・・http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2098...

キルギスタンでの大統領選の結果はまだ出ない。↓

The people of this strategically important Central Asian nation・・・Kyrgyzstan・・・voted in a presidential election on Sunday・・・ ＜「革命」後、女性の大統領がこの国を議院内閣制にした。↓＞ Since the violence last year, a caretaker government led by President Roza Otunbayeva has ushered in reforms designed to prevent future discord, including watering down the president’s powers and creating Central Asia’s first parliamentary republic. ・・・ ＜この現大統領は今年末に退任するが、元ソ連の中央アジア諸国の中じゃ、自発的退任は初めてのことだってさ。↓＞ Ms. Otunbayeva has vowed to step down at the end of the year, making her the first leader of Kyrgyzstan, and all of former Soviet Central Asia for that matter, to voluntarily leave power since the Soviet collapse. Armed mobs drove both of her predecessors out of the country. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/31/world/asia/kyrgy...

・・・Members voted by 107 votes to 14 to accept Palestine as a full member state・・・ Fifty-two countries, including the UK, abstained.・・・France was among those voting in the Palestinians' favour・・・ The US, Canada, Germany and the Netherlands voted against・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/31/unesco...

＜米国がユネスコへの自国の拠出金を停止する根拠法は二つあるんだね。↓＞ ・・・The prohibition on U.S. funding of U.N. agencies that recognize a Palestinian state was included in two pieces of legislation that were signed into law by President George H.W. Bush in 1990 and President Bill Clinton in 1994.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-secur...

・・・Syria has accepted an Arab initiative to immediately halt months of violence, free prisoners and open dialogue with the opposition・・・ ＜国際メディアとオブザーバーの受け入れにも同意した。↓＞ Syria also agreed to allow Arab and international media and observers into the country・・・ ＜しかし、武力弾圧の停止と部隊の撤退をオブザーバー達が監視する条項がない。↓＞ Assessing the Cairo agreement, diplomats pointed to problems of implementation in the absence of any provision for observers to monitor the end of violence or the withdrawal of regime forces. ＜反体制派との対話がダマスカスで行われることになっているため、亡命活動家は参加できない。↓＞ Another significant sticking point is the regime's insistence that dialogue with the opposition take place in Damascus, which would exclude exiled activists.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/02/syrian...

ワシントンポストとガーディアンが突然久しぶりに対イラン攻撃の記事を載せた。↓

＜イスラエルでコラムニストが、首相と国防相が対イラン攻撃の根回しに動いているとすっぱ抜いた。↓＞ ・・・Nahum Barnea normally ＜who＞ writes a column for the Yediot Ahronot newspaper,・・・last Friday・・・produced a bombshell story under the headline “Atomic Pressure.” His main point: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his defense minister, Ehud Barak, are determined to attack Iran, and are pressuring Israel’s reluctant military and intelligence chiefs to go along.・・・ ＜先週末、イタリアのNATO軍基地で、イスラエル空軍は大規模な演習を行った。↓＞ Several accounts described a major Israeli air force exercise at a NATO base in Italy over the weekend, which was said to include all of the types of planes Israel would use in an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.・・・ ＜これだけ話がリークされてるということは、イスラエルが本気ではないことを示している。↓＞ All the smoke also helps to obscure Israel’s real intentions. After so many cries of “Wolf!,” it seems fairly probable that when Israel really does prepare to attack, no one will believe the press leaks. That includes now.http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/...

＜なお、イスラエルが長距離ロケットの試射を水曜に行ったことも、この関連で話題になっている。↓＞ ・・・Israel test-fired a "rocket propulsion system" capable of striking Iran on Wednesday, adding to speculation over its intentions regarding military action. However, defence officials said the exercise had been planned for a long time.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/02/us-hea...

＜英国政府は、かなり大真面目に、イスラエル/米国が対イラン攻撃をした場合に備えて準備をしている。 第一にマルウェアによる攻撃からイラン核計画は立ち直っている。↓＞ Iran has restored all the capability it lost in a sophisticated cyber-attack last year.The Stuxnet computer worm, thought to have been engineered by the Americans and Israelis, sabotaged many of the centrifuges the Iranians were using to enrich uranium.・・・ ＜第二に、今後一年間で、イランはその核計画に必要な物資を全て地下要塞に運び入れると目されている。↓＞ ・・・within the next 12 months Iran may have hidden all the material it needs to continue a covert weapons programme inside fortified bunkers.・・・ ＜第三に、イランはこのところ急に好戦的になっていて、サウディアラビアの外交官をパキスタンで殺害したり、駐米大使の暗殺を図ったりしている。↓＞ Iran was behind the murder of a Saudi diplomat in Karachi in May, as well as the audacious plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, which was uncovered last month.・・・ ＜だから、米国が対イラン核施設へのミサイル攻撃を敢行する可能性がある、と英国防省は見ている。↓＞ The Ministry of Defence believes the US may decide to fast-forward plans for targeted missile strikes at some key Iranian facilities・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/02/uk-mil...

An Arab League plan to end eight months of violence in Syria appeared close to collapse Thursday less than 24 hours after the Syrian regime agreed to implement the proposal. As many as 20 people were reportedly killed in the flashpoint city of Homs in central Syria and fighting was also reported in the town of Tel Kalakh near the border with Lebanon, according to opposition activists.・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/11...

パレスティナ当局、ユネスコ以外の国連関係機関には、既に加盟申し込みをしているWTO等を除き、加盟申し込みはしない意向を表明。↓

Palestinian officials said Thursday that after obtaining membership to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization this week, they will concentrate on gaining full U.N. membership and not seek to join any other U.N. agency.・・・ Malki said applications already submitted to U.N. bodies, such as that for the World Trade Organization, will not be withdrawn or frozen.Abbas had officially submitted on Sept. 23 an application for full U.N. membership, which Malki said had nothing to do with the application for UNESCO started 22 years ago.・・・ ＜語るに落ちたと言うべきか、米・イスラエルに配慮したんだろな。↓＞ Malki insisted that the reason for not pursing more memberships had nothing to do with U.S. or Israeli threats.・・・http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2011/11/...

・・・the Balfour declaration of 1917, which opened the way to Jewish immigration with its vision of “a Jewish homeland” in Palestine, was the product of “peculiar attitudes to the Jews” by then-Prime Minister Lloyd George and his foreign minister, Arthur Balfour, and a “special concatenation of circumstances,” including Britain’s desire to detach Russian Jews from Bolshevism. Lenin seized power in St. Petersburg the night before the declaration’s issuance; had he acted “a few days earlier,” Montefiore writes, “the Balfour Declaration may never have been issued.”・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/...

・・・＜As for the＞ suicide attacks carried out by Palestinians in recent years・・・the higher the unemployment rate, the more mature, educated and experienced the people who join the potential reservoir of would-be suicide attackers, the study found. And this allows recruiters to be more choosy, handpicking only the most suitable candidates. ・・・http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2011/11/...

・・・s antisemitism was a unifying factor for far-right parties in the 1910s, 20s and 30s, Islamophobia has become the unifying factor in the early decades of the 21st century・・・ ＜仏伊墺から今や蘭・スカンディナヴィアへと広がる極右政党の台頭。↓＞ Parties touting anti-immigrant and Islamophobic ideas have spread beyond established strongholds in France, Italy and Austria to the traditionally liberal Netherlands and Scandinavia, and now have significant parliamentary blocs in eight countries. Other nations have seen the rise of nationalist street movements like the English Defence League (EDL). ・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/06/far-ri...

・・・Barak dismissed concerns raised in Israel in recent days that military action against Iran could lead to heavy casualties in an Iranian counterstrike or in missile attacks by the Iranian-backed militant groups Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. “Let’s assume we get to war against our will,” Barak said. “There will not be 100,000 dead, not 10,000 dead and not 1,000 dead. And Israel will not be destroyed. There’s no way today to prevent certain damage. It’s not pleasant on the home front . . . [but] if everyone just goes into their homes, there will not be 500 dead, either. And I don’t belittle a single fatality.”・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/ba...

The Arab League has rejected a demand by Syria to alter its plan for ending the country's conflict, which has reportedly left at least 3,500 dead. ・・・ Syria said it had agreed to the plan in principle, but was seeking amendments. Reports said it wanted to reduce the number of observers from 500 to 40. Critics accused Damascus of stalling for time.・・・ ・・・On Sunday, there were reports of a grenade attack on a building of the ruling party in the capital Damascus. If confirmed, it would be the first such attack reported inside the capital since the uprising began in March. It was claimed by the Free Syrian Army, a group of military defectors. At least 27 people were killed on Saturday, according to opposition activists, including four government intelligence agents whose car was ambushed in Hama by gunmen believed to be army defectors.・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-158105...

エジプトに、第二革命が勃発。今度の標的は軍部。↓

・・・On Sunday・・・ and・・・on Saturday, ・・・Thousands of Egyptian protesters remain in Cairo's Tahrir Square after two days of clashes in which at least 13 people were killed and hundreds injured.・・・ The violence comes a week before the country's first parliamentary elections since President Hosni Mubarak was overthrown in February. ・・・ Parliamentary elections are due to begin on 28 November and take three months. Earlier in November, Egypt's military rulers produced a draft document setting out principles for a new constitution. ＜先般、軍政府が明らかにした新憲法の大綱は、非軍人による統制を軍事予算を含め、受けないというものだった。↓＞ Under those guidelines, the military would be exempted from civilian oversight, as would its budget. ・・・ In recent weeks protesters - mostly Islamists and young activists - have been holding demonstrations against a draft constitution that they say would allow the military to retain too much power after a new civilian government is elected.・・・ They've finally lost patience with the military rulers who say they're committed to the revolution and the transition to democracy, but the protesters don't believe it any more. Many people here are now openly calling for the resignation of the head of the military council - Field Marshall Tantawi - and the end of the whole system of military rule. ・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15809739

Turkey's prime minister on Tuesday said for the first time that Syria's president must step down・・・ "For the welfare of your own people and the region, just leave that seat," Mr. Erdogan said in a televised speech. "If you want to see someone who has fought until death against his own people, just look at Nazi Germany, just look at Hitler, at Mussolini, at Nicolae Ceausescu in Romania," he said. "If you cannot draw any lessons from these, then look at the Libyan leader who was killed just 32 days ago."・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240529702045...

・・・at least 22 Egyptians have been killed by live bullets since street battles began on Saturday・・・ ・・・the health minister, Amr Helmy, became the first government figure to acknowledge that deaths had been caused by live ammunition, but insisted that the security forces were not behind the shootings.・・・ ・・・medical experts say it ＜could＞ not be・・・a rubber-coated bullet or tear gas canister -- two other types of ammunition that have caused deaths in recent days・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/24/tahrir...

女性は、当局によって、ぶん殴られて両腕を骨折した上、性的にいたぶられた。↓

・・・The prominent US-Egyptian journalist Mona Eltahawy has described a brutal sexual and physical assault that she says she suffered after being arrested by Egyptian riot police during a 12-hour ordeal inside Cairo's interior ministry. ・・・she had bones broken in both wrists by security officials, who also grabbed her breasts and genitals.・・・ ・・・she reported being more properly treated by the army, who photographed her bruises and apologised for her treatment at the hands of the police."The past 12 hours were painful and surreal but I know I got off much easier than so many other Egyptians. God knows what would've happened if I wasn't dual citizen."・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/24/journa...

・・・In Cairo, the Arab League gave President Bashar al-Assad another 24 hours to accept observers to monitor the violence or face economic sanctions, generating criticism that the pan-Arab organisation was being too slow and too lenient after suspending Syria last week.・・・ France, meanwhile, is talking up a plan to set up "humanitarian corridors" to deliver aid to Syria and pressing the Arab League to consider it. ・・・ In Israel, which appears to prefer the stability of the Damascus regime it knows and dislikes to the uncertainty that might follow its fall, the deputy prime minister, Moshe Yaalon, described the situation as "irreversible," adding that Assad seemed to be nearing his end as leader.http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/24/syrian...

A coalition of Egyptian political parties and protest leaders, seizing on a revival of mass protests that echoed February's revolution, united around a plan calling for an interim civilian government to take power from the ruling military. ＜担ぎ上げられるのはエルバラダイらしい。↓＞ The plan would put Nobel peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei, a once-divisive figure who has gained some credibility as a unifying force, in a so-called National Salvation Government that would include a longtime Muslim Brotherhood leader who broke from the group in June. ・・・ Protesters received a boost from Washington, as the White House called for "the full transfer of power to a civilian government…as soon as possible." The U.S., source of $1.3 billion a year in aid to Egypt's military, also called for an independent investigation into protesters' deaths. ・・・ ＜イスラム同朋団だけはウロウロし続けてるみたいね。↓＞ But Egypt's largest and best organized opposition party, the Muslim Brotherhood, remains at odds with nearly every other opposition group in Egypt. It has refused to back or participate in the recent protests in Tahrir Square, and its leaders declined a bid by activists to win their support for the leadership coalition.・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240529702046...

・・・An attack by Nato aircraft on Pakistani troops that allegedly killed as many as 28 soldiers and looks set to further poison relations between the US and Pakistan was an act of self-defence, a senior western official has claimed.・・・ ＜前にも述べたことがあるが、両国の国境線は定かではない、という問題がそもそもある。↓＞ The vagueness of the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan is one potential, and relatively innocent, explanation for the incident. Drawn up by the British Raj in 1893, there is little agreement on where the so-called Durand Line actually falls, meaning troops from either side of the border can wander into the neighbouring country without realising it. One senior military official said that, in places, rival maps have discrepancies of "multiples of kilometres -- sometimes as much as five kilometres".・・・ The attack happened just a day after John Allen, the US commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan, met with Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, the Pakistani army chief, to discuss enhanced co-operation on the border. ＜根本的問題は、アフガニスタン反体制派がパキスタン軍の「庇護」を受けているところにある。↓＞ But a more troubling explanation would be that insurgents in the area were operating under the nose of Pakistani security forces. Many Afghan officials believe Pakistan helps the Taliban with cross-border operations.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/26/nato-a...

・・・The attack took place at an outpost on a mountain about 1.5 miles from the border・・・ ＜大部分がアフガニスタン軍のNATO部隊が、パキスタン領内のパキスタン駐屯地（post）の方向から射撃されたので、NATO軍に近接航空支援を依頼し、ヘリコプターと恐らくは固定翼機でもって反撃を加えたらしい。↓＞ US officials suggested the Nato force was acting in self-defence, having come under fire from across the border inside Pakistan. Isaf officers said the incident happened when a mostly Afghan force came under fire when carrying out operations in southern Kunar province. They called in "close air support" from Nato, which responded with helicopters and possibly fixed-wing planes as well. The Isaf officers said the fact that the border in the mountainous area was in dispute may have played a role. An Afghan government official echoed the claims of western diplomats that the Afghan-Nato team had received incoming fire from "the so-called Pakistani post", prompting them to call for close air support. "The most important point here is that they were receiving fire from the direction of the post," he said. ＜これまで、パキスタン軍の検問所の近くからタリバンの攻撃を受けたことが何度もあるという。↓＞ In the past, confusion has been caused by Taliban insurgents firing into Afghanistan from positions close to Pakistani checkpoints, making it appear Nato and Afghan troops were under attack from the Pakistani posts. Pakistani soldiers have shot into the air to warn Nato helicopters they have crossed the border, which has been mistaken by the aircraft crew for incoming fire.・・・ ＜パキスタン政府は、アフガニスタンのNATO軍への補給路２か所を閉鎖するとともに、米要員にシャムシ空軍基地から15日以内に撤退するよう要求した。↓＞ Pakistan has closed two border crossings that act as a supply route for Nato troops in Afghanistan, and ordered the US to leave the Shamsi air base in western Pakistan – which has been a staging post for drones – within 15 days.・・・ Afghans living in Kunar said they were delighted by the strike against the bases, saying they believed Taliban fighters were being harboured by the Pakistani army. ＜国境近くに住んでいるアフガニスタン人いわく、タリバンは平服で攻撃してからパキスタン軍の検問所に行ったり、ニセのヒゲをつけて攻撃し、それからパキスタン軍の軍装に着替えたりするってんだな。だから、彼らは、今度の事件に快哉を叫んでいる。↓＞ "These terrorists wear civilian clothes and then when they have done their attacks in Afghanistan they go to the Pakistan checkpoints," said Qari Ehsanullah Ehsan, a tribal leader from the province, "Some of them wear fake beards and then put on Pakistani military clothes when they finish their operations. "The people of Kunar are happy. We have been telling the Americans for a long time that the Pakistanis are bringing the Taliban to our villages."http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/27/pakist...

・・・Pakistani officials said the posts hit are 300 metres into Pakistani territory, but Isaf officers say the border in that area is disputed. Major General Athar Abbas, chief spokesman for the Pakistan military・・・said, however, that the firing lasted for over an hour, while Isaf made "no attempt" to contact the Pakistani side using an established border co-ordination system to report that they had come under fire. He said that the map references of the posts were previously passed to Isaf. "This was a totally unprovoked attack. There are no safe havens or hideouts left there [for militants] in Mohmand," he said. "This was a visible, well-made post, on top of ridges, made of concrete. Militants don't operate from mountaintops, from concrete structures."http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/27/nato-r...

・・・According to nationally representative Gallup surveys conducted across the country in four rounds between late March and September, most Egyptians long for a return to normalcy, and see the country's biggest problems as economic, not political. Among the wider public, the military is popular, while continued demonstrations that are viewed as crippling the economy and prolonging instability are not. But by responding to the protesters with brute force, Egypt's ruling generals may have squandered that good will. While Egyptians oppose continued sit-ins, they reject attacks on civilians with even greater fervor.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/11/28/w...

＜つい最近まで、米国では、夫が妻を強姦することは罪ではなかった。↓＞ ・・・it was only in 1980 that the California Legislature made it illegal for a husband to rape his wife. As late as the 1950s, the right of a husband to take his wife by force was enshrined in the laws of every state. As legal authority Rollin Perkins put it in 1957: "A man does not commit rape by having sexual intercourse with his lawful wife, even if he does so by force and against her will."・・・ ＜かつてのイギリスでは、妊娠したらそれは和姦の証拠だとされていた。↓＞ ・・・early English courts took pregnancy as proof that the sex was consensual. The idea was that both the man and the woman needed to experience sexual pleasure to conceive a child, so a pregnancy showed that the woman enjoyed the encounter. And this contemptible theory is not found only in history books. In 1995, North Carolina legislator Henry Aldridge, when arguing against a law to aid pregnant rape victims, said: "The facts show that people who are raped, who are truly raped, the juices don't flow, the body functions don't work, and they don't get pregnant." ＜旧約聖書の申命記には、処女を強姦した者はその女と結婚せよと書かれている。ルネッサンス期のイタリアでも、強姦は番うための儀式ととらえられていた。↓＞ Particularly galling to Western readers of the Gulnaz story was the idea of pushing a rape victim to marry her ravisher. But the Afghan judge who told her she could escape from jail by marrying the rapist was in line with Judeo-Christian tradition. Deuteronomy 22:28-29 lays out how if a man meets a virgin who is not betrothed and "seizes her and lies with her," then "she shall be his wife." The Afghan judge would also have found friendly company in the courts of Renaissance Italy, which viewed rape as a kind of mating ritual. In one case in Venice, a rapist was given the choice of going to jail for six months, paying a fine or marrying his victim. The man chose marriage.・・・http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-...

・・・The rulers of Qatar and of Saudi Arabia are untroubled by the obvious contradictions in their policy toward this year's Arab revolts: They are defending Bahrain's ruling family against the majority Shiite population while loudly criticizing and sanctioning the Assad regime for oppressing its own majority Sunni population. And they are demanding democratic rule in Syria while accepting none of it at home.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/12/07/r...

・・・“Basically, it’s inevitable,” Barak said in a telephone interview before flying Wednesday to Washington for meetings with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other administration officials. “The Assad family, through their own behavior, have lost their last drop of legitimacy and put themselves beyond the point of no return with their brutal slaughter of their own people. He has ceased to be something relevant.” “It might take many weeks,” Barak added, “but it’s not a matter of months or years.” ＜イスラエルの戦略問題担当相も時間の問題、と語る。↓＞In a separate interview, Moshe Yaalon, the minister of strategic affairs, said: “It’s a matter of time and bloodshed before we will witness Assad’s departure. That is our assessment.”・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/is...

・・・Egypt. The country has retreated from the moment of empowerment and national dignity that the uprising symbolized and is now grappling with a squalid politics and the normalization of violence.・・・ ＜軍部も革命各グループもイスラム主義者達もリベラル達もみーんなしょうもない奴らばかりだとよ。ちょいと上から目線が過ぎやしねーの？↓＞ Each of Egypt's primary political actors -- the military, revolutionary groups, Islamists, and liberals -- have contributed mightily to the country's current political impasse and economic collapse through a combination of incompetence, narcissism, and treachery.・・・ ＜ツイッターやFacebookを活用したのはいいけど、そんなもん使ってるのはエジプト国民のほんの一部。その後、地に足のついた活動を奴らは全然やってないとさ。↓＞ The instigators of Mubarak's fall have seemed to be more focused on burnishing their revolutionary cred on Twitter and Facebook -- which are not accessible to the vast majority of Egyptians -- than doing the hard work of political organizing. For months, the revolutionaries have largely spurned the political process that began after Mubarak's ouster. After they were trounced in the March 19 constitutional referendum, many tuned out and began searching for ways to recapture the lightning in a bottle that was January 25.・・・ ＜その中でもともと組織力が一番あったイスラム主義者達が結果的に大きく力を伸ばしちゃったとも。↓＞ If the revolutionaries and their supporters are now stunned that the Islamists -- both the Brotherhood and the Salafists -- are set to dominate post-uprising Egypt, they must take a hard look at what they have done, or not done, over the last 11 months. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/12/19/t...

「同盟国」ロシアからの圧力もあり、アサド政権はようやくアラブ連盟の国際監視員受け入れに同意したが、反体制派はせせら笑っている。↓

Bowing to international pressure, including from long-time ally Russia, Syria on Monday accepted an Arab League plan to allow international monitors into the country to observe a situation・・・ Anti-government activists greet the news of the deal with “extreme skepticism,”・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/sy...

＜シリアにおけるアサド支援者の数やイランにおけるハメネイ支援者の数なんて、算定根拠は？って聞きたくなるな。↓＞ ・・・Assad's key backers -- those without whose support he would have to leave power -- consisted of only about 3,600 members out of a population of about 23 million. That is less than 0.02 percent. Assad is not alone in his dependence on a small coalition. Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's coalition is even smaller. His essential supporters include the Revolutionary Guard's leadership, the economically essential bonyad conglomerates, key clerics, and a smattering of business interests, totaling, according to our survey of Iran experts, about 2,000 in a population of well over 70 million. ＜最高指導者の支援者の数が極端に少ないとその体制はすさまじく腐敗するってのはそのとおりだろな。↓＞ Any political system that depends on such a small percentage of the population to sustain a leader in power is destined to be a corrupt, rent-seeking regime in which loyalty is purchased through bribery and privilege.・・・ ＜イラン、イラク、更にはベネズエラがシリアに命綱の資金援助をしてんだね。↓＞ Iran and Iraq offered Assad's regime $5 billion in aid, with $1.5 billion paid immediately. The $5 billion is equal to about 40 percent of Syrian government revenue. Since the announcement of Arab League sanctions, Iran, Iraq, and Venezuela have signed agreements to expand trade and investment in Syria to the tune of more than $7 billion in 2012, including building an oil refinery.・・・ This injection of cash in the short term is likely to keep the military and security forces on his side. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/12/20/i...

・・・Sudanese Gen. Mohammad Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi, the head of the Arab League observer mission, ＜told＞ reporters that so far the Assad regime had been "very cooperative."・・・ He is a staunch loyalist of Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, who is wantedby the International Criminal Court for genocide and crimes against humanity for his government's policies in Darfur. And Dabi's own record in the restive Sudanese region, where he stands accused of presiding over the creation of the feared Arab militias known as the "janjaweed," is enough to make any human rights activist blanch.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/12/27/t...

The largest demonstrations in Syria since the summer have laid siege to parts of Damascus and most key towns and cities, emboldened by Arab League monitors whose presence appeared to provide protesters with cover from regime gunmen.An estimated 500,000 people are thought to have taken to the streets across the country・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/30/syrian...

After a month of negotiations, the two largest Syrian opposition groups said Saturday that they had agreed on a common approach to organizing a transitional government, a move that could help unify a movement divided between exiles and domestic dissidents that has differed about how to topple PresidentBashar al-Assad. In their agreement, the two groups, the Syrian National Council and theNational Coordination Body for Democratic Change in Syria, said they rejected any foreign military intervention in Syria, a statement that seemed to preclude a Libyan-style intervention in the country. ＜アラブ諸国によるもの以外の軍事介入を排斥。そんな余裕、いつまで続くかな？↓＞ They left open, though, the possibility of an Arab military presence. One of the leaders of the National Coordination Body, Haytham Manna, said that might include Arab peacekeepers, for instance, in Homs, a city besieged by government troops.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/world/middleeast...

・・・Since Napoleon invaded Egypt in 1798, France and Turkey have competed for dominance in the Middle East. France’s rise as a Mediterranean power has been an inverse function of Turkish decline around the same sea. As the Ottoman Empire gradually collapsed, France acquired Algeria, Tunisia and, temporarily, Egypt. The French took one final bite from the dying empire by securing control over Syria and Lebanon after World War I. ・・・ ＜それまでフランスに負け続けたトルコは、第一次世界大戦後、フランスの徹底した世俗主義まで、トルコは輸入した。↓＞ Even Turkey once looked to France as a model: when Mustafa Kemal Ataturk founded modern Turkey in 1923, he championed the French model of hard secularism, which stipulates freedom from religion in government, politics and education. ・・・ ＜再び勃興してきたトルコを、フランスがEUに入れないようにしてきたのは当たり前だってさ。↓＞ ・・・their growing rivalry is one reason France has objected to Turkey’s bid for European Union membership. Taken together with France’s efforts to create a European-Mediterranean Union, which Nicolas Sarkozy conceived in 2008 as a way to place France at the helm of the Mediterranean world, one thing has become obvious to the Turks: Paris won’t allow Turkey into the European Union or let it become a powerful player in a French-led Mediterranean region. ・・・ ＜その間も、トルコの貿易は、EU離れ、イスラム世界志向の傾向が募りつつある。↓＞ In 1999, the European Union accounted for over 56 percent of Turkish trade; in 2011, it was just 41 percent. Over the same period, Islamic countries’ share of Turkish trade climbed to 20 percent from 12 percent. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/opinion/sunday/t...

1. The people won't support a military take over2. A vibrant Pakistani news media is watching3. An independent judiciary is watching4. Pakistan's allies won't support a coup5. The army has better options than a couphttp://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/16/world/asia/pakis...

The publication of a nude picture of a popular Iranian actress currently in exile in Paris has sparked enormous Internet buzz, and polarized many Iranians conflicted about nudity―at a time that Iran’s independent movie community is under severe repression by authorities. Is it a courageous act of challenging Islamic and cultural taboos, or an insensitive and selfish move that might give Tehran hardliners an excuse in to put more pressure on Iran’s independent film community?・・・http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/01/20/n...

Egyptian authorities confirmed Saturday that a political coalition dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, the 84-year-old group that virtually invented political Islam, had won about 47 percent of the seats in the first Parliament elected since the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. An alliance of ultraconservative Islamists won the next largest share of seats, about 25 percent.・・・ The tally, with the two groups of Islamists together winning about 70 percent of the seats, indicates the deep cultural conservatism of the Egyptian public, which is expressing its will through free and fair elections for the first time in more than six decades. ＜しかし、（幸いなことに）この二つは水と油だ。↓＞ But the two groups have described very different visions and appear to be rivals rather than collaborators. The Brotherhood has said it intends to respect personal liberties and will focus on economic and social issues, gradually nudging the culture toward its conservative values. By contrast, the ultraconservatives, known as Salafis, put a higher priority on legislation on Islamic moral issues, like the consumption of alcohol, women’s dress and the contents of popular culture. ＜残りの約30%中、植民地時代に起源を持つワフド党が最大勢力、次いでキリスト教コプト派を中心とする政党連合が約10%を占め、エジプト革命の担い手達の政党連合や旧政党系の勢力がそれぞれ数%を占めた。↓＞ Among the remaining roughly 30 percent of parliamentary seats, the next largest share was won by the Wafd Party, a liberal party recognized under Mr. Mubarak and with roots dating to Egypt’s colonial period. It was trailed by a coalition known as the Egyptian Bloc. It included the Free Egyptians, a business-friendly liberal party founded by a Coptic Christian businessman, Naguib Sawiris, and favored by many members of the country’s Coptic Christian minority, about 10 percent of the public. The Egyptian Bloc also included the liberal Social Democratic Party, which leans further to the left on economic issues. A coalition of parties founded by the young leaders of the revolt that unseated Mr. Mubarak won only a few percent of the seats, as did a handful of offshoots of the former governing party.http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/world/middleeast...

The Arab League・・・asked that Mr. Assad yield power to his vice president after the formation of the unity government within two months. The League also requested that the United Nations Security Council endorse the League's new strategy for resolving the abiding violence in Syria. ＜また、同連盟がシリアに送っていた監視団の派遣期間を一ヵ月延長した。↓＞ The League also extended its observer mission for a second month. ・・・ ＜派遣団の規模も２倍の約300名に増やすことにした。↓＞ The League・・・will seek to double the size of the mission to about 300 people, cover additional hot spots in the country and improve the training and qualifications of observers on the ground・・・ ＜サウディアラビアは、同連盟が手ぬるいとして監視団からは手を引くと宣言した。↓＞ But the mission, a landmark undertaking for the Arab League, lost support from an important member when Saudi Arabia said it would withdraw its participation.・・・ ＜シリアの反体制派とサウディアラビアが手を組みつつある。↓＞ Activist opponents of the regime have now been joined by Saudi Arabia in criticizing the mission's ability to get the Syrian regime to comply with its agreements with the Arab League.・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240529702046...

・・・ The Islamists' newly discovered public support is not the product of decades of unwavering philosophical followership, but the outcome of weeks of disciplined, effective campaigning in a country of undecideds.・・・ Supporters of secular and religious parties are remarkably similar on many of the key questions facing Egypt, from domestic priorities to foreign policy.・・・ ＜イスラム同朋会系政党支持者もリベラル政党支持者も、言論の自由、宗教の自由、集会の自由を憲法で謳う必要があると考えている。↓＞ The Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Freedom and Justice Party supporters are at least as likely as those of the Free Egyptians Party, a self-proclaimed liberal group, to favor including fundamental protections for freedom of speech, religion, and assembly in a new constitution. ・・・ ＜女性の権利についても同様。↓＞ Again, supporters of the Freedom and Justice Party are virtually identical to those of the Free Egyptians Party on questions of women's rights, even those explicitly regulated by religious guidelines like divorce.・・・ ＜イスラム原理主義政党の支持者でさえ、上出の二つの政党の支持者達と他の宗教に対する寛容の気持ちは共通している。↓＞ Supporters of the conservative al-Nour Party, as well as those of the Freedom and Justice Party, are little different from those of the Free Egyptians Party, a group founded by Naguib Sawiris, a Christian, on reported interreligious acceptance.・・・ ＜イスラエルとの関係の基本については見解が真っ二つに割れていて、若干この基本を維持することを支持する人の割合が高いが、いずれにせよ、上出の３政党の支持者間でこの傾向に違いはない。↓＞ While the public is split on whether the Camp David Accords are good or bad for the country, this same divide cuts across political persuasions. This suggests that Israel and its supporters will need to engage the Egyptian public on the future of relations between the two countries, rather than seek to empower a particular political party believed to be friendlier to Egypt's Jewish neighbor. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/01/24/T...

The Arab League said Saturday that it was suspending its observer mission in Syria amid escalating violence that has left scores dead in recent days.・・・ The 100 or so monitors will remain in Syria but won't make field visits to trouble spots・・・ ・・・the Arab League is trying to win U.N. support for its political plan. The Security Council is expected to consider the matter this week. ＜しかし、ロシアは、シリアに係る経済制裁や体制変革を内容とする決議案の採択に反対している。↓＞ But Russia, which wields veto power on the U.N. Security Council, has said it will not support any resolution calling for sanctions against Syria or "regime change" in Damascus. ・・・http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-f...

反対しているのは、ロシアだけじゃなく、ブラジル、中共、インド、南アも。↓

・・・Russia, along with Brazil, China, India and South Africa, believe “it would be extremely dangerous if” the West continues to be “carried away by this regime-change idea,” he said.・・・ ＜これについては、ロシア外交のプーチン化である、或いは、このところロシアは欧米にやられっぱなしだったので巻き返しを図っている、或いはまた、ロシアは米国等と違って軽々に同盟国を見放さないということをアピールしようとしている、といった分析がなされている。↓＞ Critics say Moscow’s tough line at the United Nations reflects what one senior council diplomat described as “the Putinization of Russian foreign policy,” on the eve of what many expect will be the return of Vladimir Putin to the presidency. Other analysts say Russia is trying to reassert its authority in the council following a period in which the United States and Europe prevailed in the handling of several major crises, engineering the downfall of former Ivory Coast leader Laurent Gbagbo and, more recently, of Moammar Gaddafi in Libya.・・・ The crisis in Syria also has provided Moscow with an opportunity to show it is a more reliable ally than Western powers, particularly the United States, which is seen by many in the region as having abandoned one of its closest allies, former Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-secur...

・・・There are estimated to be around 37 FSA・・・Free Syrian Army・・・ battalions（大隊） of which 17 to 23 are militarily active,・・・ ＜この部隊への武器供給は、四囲の国境すべてを通じて行われている。↓＞ Some weapons are smuggled through Lebanon’s border with Syria, although the quantity is small and on an individual basis. Other weapons are brought across the border with Turkey, which FSA fighters can cross with relative ease. ・・・weapons are also crossing into Syria from Iraq on a “tribe to tribe” basis, meaning the Sunni tribes of Iraq’s Al-Anbar province supplying their brethren in eastern Syria.・・・the Kurds in northern Iraq are also dispatching armaments to the Kurds of northeast Syria although most of it is being stockpiled for now. ＜もちろん、シリア軍の武器も流れてきている。↓＞ Another valuable source of arms is coming from the regular Syrian Army itself・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2012/01...

・・・After fighting for Colonel Qaddafi as he struggled to stay in power, the Tuaregs helped themselves to a considerable quantity of sophisticated weaponry before returning to Mali. When they got here, they reinvigorated a longstanding rebellion and blossomed into a major challenge for this impoverished desert nation, an important American ally against the regional Al Qaeda franchise. ・・・ The rebels — perhaps as many as 1,000, commanded by a former colonel in Libya’s army・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/06/world/africa/tua...

・・・They see "wrong" as embodied by the regime's assault on its people, including women and children -- it's desecration of life and suppression of freedom.The opposition members I spoke to assured me: This is not a sectarian, religious fight as some outsiders fear -- an uprising against the minority Alawites by majority Sunnis seeking religious dominance or Islamic rule. It is a fight for freedom and the dignity of life as taught in Islam. It is a fight for democracy.・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2012/0...

Talk to Hamas? Talk to Taliban? Thank the Arab Spring for those possibilities. The Arab Spring's message of freedom through nonviolence has isolated Iran and Syria, helped elevate moderate Islamists, and pushed radical groups to weigh alternatives.・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-v...

・・・Hamza Kashgari, 23, a newspaper columnist, tweeted doubts about Muhammad on the prophet's birthday last weekend. After death threats, he fled to Malaysia on Tuesday and was detained at Kuala Lumpur airport while trying to leave on Thursday. Malaysian police said Kashgari was handed over to Saudi officials and flown back on Sunday morning, with flight arrangements handled by the Saudi authorities. Malaysia and Saudi Arabia do not share a formal extradition treaty, but do have close ties as fellow Muslim countries. The Malaysian interior minister, Hishammuddin Hussein, said in a statement that Kashgari's deportation was due to a common agreement.・・・ Kashgari had tweeted about Muhammad last week: "I have loved things about you and I have hated things about you, and there is a lot I don't understand about you. I will not pray for you."・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/12/malays...

・・・ in the months and years after 9/11, the US collaborated closely with Syria, which became an ally in the war on terror and a frequent destination for victims of extraordinary rendition. Syrian torturers worked hand in hand with US interrogators.・・・ ・・・in the chilling words of former CIA agent Robert Baer, in 2004: "If you want a serious interrogation, you send a prisoner to Jordan. If you want them to be tortured, you send them to Syria."・・・ These days, however, US politicians from across the spectrum piously condemn the Syrian regime for its crimes against humanity; two weeks ago, a bipartisan group of senators introduced a resolution condemning Assad for "gross human rights violations" and the use of "torture". Who says Americans don't do irony, eh?・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/1...

＜ハマスが反アサドを公言。↓＞ Gaza's Hamas prime minister has expressed support for Syrian protesters seeking to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.Ismail Haniyeh's comments were the first time a senior leader of the Palestinian group has publicly rebuked its longtime patron.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/24/hamas-...

＜サウディアラビアが反体制派への武器援助を示唆。↓＞ Saudi Arabia has backed the arming of Syria's opposition guerrilla army in remarks that could signal an intervention by the Sunni Muslim superpower in the Assad regime's crackdown against the uprising.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/24/saudi-...

・・・Pakistani courts have also repeatedly failed to convict terrorism suspects, even when the cases against them seemed clear-cut. They overturned both a ban on Jamaat-ud-Dawa -- the public face of the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which was responsible for the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks -- and a detention order against its leader, Hafiz Saeed. In a recent case, they acquitted four Pakistani Taliban activists accused of an attack on the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) headquarters in Lahore. As many Pakistanis have told them, this kind of verdict not only undermines the entire struggle against terrorism in Pakistan, but also encourages extrajudicial executions by the police and Army. In this case, all four men were promptly detained by the ISI under special anti-terrorism laws. And within a few weeks, all were dead under very suspicious circumstances. ・・・ Several local leaders and supporters of the Lawyers' Movement whom I interviewed between 2007 and 2009 were extremely anti-American even by Pakistani standards, and they admitted that they were motivated to join the movement by outrage not just at the dismissal of the chief justice but also at Musharraf's action in storming the Red Mosque, an Islamist militant headquarters in Islamabad.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/02/29/a...

Leaders of the Palestinian Islamist movement, Hamas, say they will not help Iran militarily in any conflict between Israel and the Islamic Republic.・・・ ＜彼らが、シーア派のイランの援助をあてにする必要がなくなったこともその背景にあるようだ。↓＞ ＜Qatar＞ has recently been pushing for a reconciliation deal between Hamas and its long-time rival faction, Fatah, which dominates the Palestinian Authority and is in power in the West Bank. ＜例えば、スンニ派のカタールが既にしこたまハマスに対する援助をしてるという。↓＞ Although the figures have not been confirmed, Mr Abdul Karim claims Qatar offered up to $2bn (£1.27bn) in aid to Hamas and the PA in order to try and push the deal through.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-172850...

・・・＜Syrian＞ leadership is going to fight very hard,” the official said. Over the long term, “the odds are against them,” he said, “but they are going to fight very hard.” After hesitating to attack civilian population centers earlier in the conflict, the regime’s “restraint . . . has been lifted・・・ ＜イランは殺傷兵器等の支援に乗り出している。↓＞ Iran had previously been supplying mainly training and equipment to suppress opposition forces but has recently begun sending small arms and sophisticated equipment for monitoring and penetrating rebel groups.・・・ ＜リビアの10分の１の広さのシリアだが、軍事力は４倍、防空能力は５倍。だから欧米等による飛行禁止区域の設定は容易ではない。↓＞ Syria, barely one-tenth the size of Libya, has an army four times bigger with five times the air defense assets, most of it supplied by Russia.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-secur...

＜この一週間で６名の准将を初めとする多数の軍人が反体制派に転じた。↓＞ ・・・At least 50 officers have defected from the army over the past week, including 15 who crossed into Turkey on Thursday and Friday, senior rebel leaders said. The latest wave, these people said, included six brigadier-generals, four colonels and a female first lieutenant.・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240529702046...

経済発展度にかかわらず、イスラム教徒が多数を占める国では、劇的に出生率が低下しつつある。↓

・・・Holding income and literacy constant, Muslim-majority countries actually seem to have significantly lower fertility levels than non-Muslim ones.・・・ ・・・where Muslim women want fewer children, they are increasingly finding ways to manage it -- with the pill or without it.・・・ For over a generation, bien pensants in the international community have been sagely informing us that "development is the best pill." If this were really true, however, the great Middle Eastern fertility revolution could never have taken place. A new world is, quite literally, being born before our eye -- and we would all do well to pay much closer attention to its significance.http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/09/t...

・・・While Hamas has not ruptured its relations with Tehran in the same manner that it abandoned Damascus, Iranian leaders are clearly irked that the Palestinian faction has refused to stand by Assad, a key strategic figure for Tehran in the region. Whereas Iran once respected Hamas's wishes and helped maintain a modicum of calm inside Gaza, the gloves are now off. Iran is using its smaller and less-expensive proxies, the PRC and PIJ, to create unrest on Hamas's turf.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/13/i...

・・・as the violence escalated in recent months,・・・Dr Fawas Akhras, who is the father of Assad's wife, Asma・・・offered the Syrian president detailed political and media handling advice as well as moral support in dozens of emails direct to his personal inbox.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/15/assad-...

上記漏出事件の結果、これを報じたガーディアンのウェッブサイト等がシリア当局の妨害を受けている。↓

・・・The Guardian's website was also reported to have been blocked in much of Syria on Thursday in an apparent attempt to prevent citizens from reading the Assad emails. Pan-Arab satellite channel Al Arabiya, which has also obtained the leaked emails, reported significant interference with its transmission signal this week.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/15/syrian...

・・・One of the most striking aspects of the emails' leak is how Assad bypassed his male aides. Instead, as his country slipped further into bloodshed, he appears to have grown increasingly reliant on media advice from a group of young, westernised Syrian expats. Most are women. At their core are・・・＜t＞he US-・・・Montana State University・・・educated Hadeel al-Ali・・・and her friend Sheherazad Jaafari, a former intern at the New York-based PR firm Brown Lloyd James.・・・ ・・・it appears that their liberal education in the US has not so far translated into any sympathy for Assad's opponents. Instead, both have linked their destinies with Assad, a man who for now at least appears to be prevailing mercilessly over his enemies.http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/16/assad-...

＜彼は、即製爆発装置の爆風に何度も晒されていた。↓＞ ・・・vets suffer from a particular kind of brain damage that results from repeated exposure to the concussive force of improvised explosive devices — I.E.D.’s — a regular event for troops traveling the roads in Iraq and Afghanistan.・・・ ＜その結果、彼は外傷性脳挫傷（TBI）状態だった。↓＞ Robert Bales, an Army staff sergeant accused of having killed 16 Afghan civilians last week, had suffered a traumatic brain injury・・・T.B.I.・・・ ＜こうして前頭葉が損傷を受けていると、PTSD的フラッシュバックが起きた場合、感情の制御ができなくなってしまう。↓＞ When the frontal lobe — which controls emotions — is damaged, it simply can’t put on the brakes if a PTSD flashback unleashes powerful feelings. ・・・ ＜TBIは、何度も爆風に伴う気圧の著しい変化を経験し、脳が拡張と縮小を繰り返すことによって、脳において分子レベルで変化が生じて起きる。↓＞ I.E.D. brain damage isn’t always the result of a single incident in which a soldier may have blacked out for seconds. Rather, it can be the cumulative impact of several such blackouts over weeks and months of exposure to blasts that put the brain through a sudden and powerful change in atmospheric pressure, expand and contract it, and produce changes at the molecular level.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/w...

・・・beneath the headlines, international forces are actually making substantial progress・・・in Afghanistan・・・ Most of the populated south has been cleared of important insurgent sanctuaries, weapons caches, and improvised-explosive-device fields. Violence was down about one-third in 2011, relative to 2010. ・・・ Meanwhile, the deterioration that had occurred in Afghanistan's north and west in recent years has been arrested and partially reversed. ・・・ there are important indicators that Afghan security forces are improving too -- not enough to quell the insurgency, but enough to prevent Taliban reconquest of the country's major cities and transportation routes even after 2014, when U.S. President Barack Obama has announced that the current NATO mission in Afghanistan will end.・・・ ＜問題が残っているのはハカニの勢力が強い東部のみ。↓＞ All is not well, of course. Afghanistan's east was 20 percent more violent statistically in 2011 than in 2010, as insurgents belonging to the infamous Haqqani network and others wreaked havoc, and international forces remain underresourced there.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/13/m...

・・・Hundreds of pages of confidential papers shown to al-Jazeera TV by a defector describe daily meetings of the heads of all Syria's security and intelligence agencies, who review events and issue orders that are then approved by the president.・・・ ・・・security chiefs paint [a] beautiful picture in their reports. They ignore many substantial facts on the ground simply to boost the president's morale.・・・ ・・・al-Jazeera said the documents were smuggled out of Syria by Abdel-Majid Barakat, head of information for the state crisis management unit, who is now hiding in Turkey with opposition activists.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/19/syria-...

・・・It is "a basic misunderstanding" to view the Syrian dictatorship according to the standards of a normal government・・・ ・・・the regime more closely resembles a mafia cartel, which is doing everything it can to defend its turf.・・・ If the Assad family were to lose its grip on power, it would spell disaster for the ruling Alawis, who make up less than 10 percent of the population, but control all key positions.・・・ ＜経済制裁でカネ回りが悪くなったので、上記マフィアが次々に非構成員の集中居住地（都市）を襲って略奪しているのがこのところの状況だって。↓＞ Assad's regime has created a monster that is slipping out of its control. The Syrian pound is rapidly losing value, and this is impelling the country's rulers to continue their violence. As soon as the Shabiha can no longer be paid, the only alternative is to have additional cities attacked to create opportunities for looting. ＜また、各諜報機関は、非構成員を次々にしょっぴいて身代金をせしめてるんだとよ。↓＞ Even inside the intelligence services, which are completely commanded by Alawi officers, greed is taking the upper hand and overshadowing all political objectives. At first, arrested demonstrators and activists were occasionally released in exchange for ransom money. ・・・Now, according to statements by former fellow prisoners, businessmen are being thrown into prison, above all at the detention facilities run by the Syrian Air Force's intelligence service -- not because they oppose the regime, but because their families are able to raise massive amounts of money to purchase their freedom.・・・ ＜非構成員の大部分はスンニ派を奉じているところ、上記連合マフィアと彼らが、殺すか殺されるかの戦いに突入しているってわけさ。↓＞ There are 18 million Sunnis against him. Assad must kill them all. Otherwise, we'll win and kill him and his henchmen."・・・http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,8...

・・・At My Lai, two platoons participated in the killing. The men of Charlie Company said later that they were doing what Calley had ordered, ridding the hamlet of Viet Cong. (Even children, Calley said at his trial, had been throwing hand grenades.)・・・ ＜虐殺をやった部隊の指揮官は終身刑から20年、更には10年に減刑され、結局、３.５年で出獄した。↓＞ Lieutenant Calley was sentenced to life in prison?an appropriate punishment for a man who had personally herded villagers into a ditch and shot them. But the sentence was later reduced to 20 years, then to 10. Calley was finally released after three and a half years of house arrest.・・・http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/03/18/s...

Syrian rebels battling the regime led by President Bashar al-Assad are running out of ammunition as black market supplies dry up, neighboring countries tighten their borders and international promises of help fail to materialize, ・・・ ・・・they are acknowledging for the first time that the rebellion, at least the armed portion of it, might be faltering in the face of a concerted government offensive aimed at definitively crushing the year-old revolt.・・・ Money appears to be less of a problem than access to ammunition. Syrian exiles continue to send money to the opposition and to the Free Syrian Army’s de facto leadership,・・・ “Fighters are coming here expecting the leadership to give them weapons, but we don’t have any. We do our best to help them with money so that they can try to buy weapons inside,”・・・ ＜カタールやサウディアラビアなんて、口先ばっかりであり、タマどころかカネまでまだ出してないようだ。↓＞ But pledges of financial support, notably from Qatar and Saudi Arabia, have not materialized, and even if they did, the money would be meaningless given the shortage of supplies・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/sy...

・・・The Tuareg rebels launched raids on a number of fronts in January, apparently helped by weaponry some had brought back from Libya, where they had been fighting on the side of Muammar Gaddafi. They are seeking independence for the Tuareg homelands, ・・・ Mali's poorly equipped army of just 7,000 men has been no match for the rebels, who hold several key towns in the north・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/23/mali-s...

・・・the "submerged" aspect of the Israeli-Azerbaijani alliance -- the security cooperation between the two countries -- is heightening the risks of an Israeli strike on Iran.・・・ ＜イスラエル、アゼルバイジャンの飛行場を一つ買ったらしいってさ。↓＞ Israel has recently been granted access to airbases on Iran's northern border.＜i.e. t＞he Israelis have bought an airfield・・・ The Azeri military has four abandoned, Soviet-era airfields that would potentially be available to the Israelis, as well as four airbases for their own aircraft・・・ Using airbases in Azerbaijan would ensure that Israel would not have to rely on its modest fleet of air refuelers or on its refueling expertise, which ＜is＞ pretty minimal.・・・They're just not very good at it.・・・ ＜空中給油やらなくても対イラン攻撃ができるし、爆弾搭載量も増やせる。↓＞ ・・・the more distance a fighter-bomber is required to travel, the more fuel it will need and the fewer weapons it can carry. Shortening the distance adds firepower, and enhances the chances for a successful strike.・・・ ＜リスキーだが、イスラエルとの経済（石油）・軍事協力はアゼルバイジャンにとってはオイシイ話。↓＞ Azerbaijan clearly profits from its deepening relationship with Israel. The Jewish state is the second largest customer for Azeri oil -shipped through the Baku-Tibilisi-Ceyhan pipeline -- and its military trade allows Azerbaijan to upgrade its military after the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE) slapped it with an arms embargo after its six-year undeclared war with Armenia over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. Finally, modernizing the Azeri military sends a clear signal to Iran that interference in Azerbaijan could be costly.・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/28/i...

Saudi Arabia has pressed Jordan to open its border with Syria to allow weapons to reach rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad's regime・・・, a move that could buoy Syria's opposition and harden the conflict in the country and across the region.・・・ Jordanian officials said they are unlikely to resist Saudi pressure for long. "We are a non-interventionist country. But if it becomes force majeure, you have to join?this is the story of Jordan," said a top Jordanian official. ・・・http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527023041...

シリアの反体制派も虐殺をしているとの指摘に対して反体制派が、何が悪いと反論している。↓

＜シリアは暴力的な社会なんだとさ。↓＞ ・・・"Children in France grow up with French, and learn to speak it perfectly," he says. "We Syrians were brought up with the language of violence. We don't speak anything else."・・・ ＜ホムスの反体制派だけでも、（スンニ派非スンニ派を問わず）拘束者の約20%を虐殺してきただと。↓＞ "Since last summer, we have executed slightly fewer than 150 men, which represents about 20 percent of our prisoners,"・・・ Hussein's burial brigade has put between 200 and 250 traitors to death since the beginning of the uprising.・・・http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,8...

Rebels fighting the government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria will be paid salaries, the opposition Syrian National Council has announced.・・・ ・・・wealthy Gulf Arab states would supply millions of dollars a month for the SNC fund.・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-175782...

Israeli security officials have estimated the number of casualties in Israel as a result of a military conflict with Iran would be fewer than 300. An assessment presented to the security cabinet last weekend anticipates three weeks of rocket and missile attacks from Lebanon and Syria, as well as probably Iran and -- to a limited extent -- Gaza・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/iran-blog/2012/apr...

In Middle Eastern countries undergoing political transitions, the only way for Islamists to maintain their legitimacy is through elections. Their own political culture may still not be democratic, but they are now defined by the new political landscape and forced in turn to redefine themselves -- much as the Roman Catholic Church ended up accepting democratic institutions even as its own practices remained oligarchic. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/04/16/t...

＜この数年、パキスタンの裁判所は与党に厳しく軍部と野党の一部に甘い。↓＞ ・・・Over the past couple of years, a perception has been growing that the country's top judiciary has been selective in its judgements, dealing harshly with the PPP leadership but being soft on the military and some opposition politicians. ＜与党は軍部に腫れ物に触るように接してきたが、最近、軍部に抵抗を始めた。↓＞ The PPP, which has traditionally been mistrusted by the country's powerful security establishment, bided its first three years in office lying low, trying to survive. It decided to strike back in December when the memo scandal broke out. This revolved around a controversial memo which a former Pakistani ambassador to the US was accused of having initiated, allegedly at the behest of President Asif Zardari, to invite US intervention to prevent a possible military coup. When the Supreme Court took up the case, questions were raised over the role the military had played in bringing that scandal to the fore. Subsequently, Prime Minister Gilani, in unprecedented remarks in late December, told the parliament that while the civilian government had stood side by side with the military in difficult times, "they (the military) can't be a state within the state". ＜与党は、全国で大衆運動を引き起こす力を持っている。↓＞ Given the PPP's potential to ignite protests across large parts of the country, the army apparently backed down, allowing the memo scandal to subside. The contempt of court case against Mr Gilani appears to have met the same fate.・・・ ＜形勢悪しと見た裁判所が、与党との対決の幕引きを始めた。↓＞ Many believe that through its order today, the court has tried to put an end to an increasingly difficult situation and has left the matter of Mr Gilani's disqualification to others, whoever they might be ”・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17851094

「イスラム教の成立」シリーズ（コラム#5420、5422、5424、5432）（未公開）を書いた時に依拠したところの、Tom Hollandの'In the Shadow of the Sword: The Birth of Islam and the Rise of the Global Arab Empire'の書評群は、全て英国のものでしたが、このたび、米国における書評が一つ出たhttp://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527023040...
ところ、このシリーズの理解が深まる内容であることから、その一部を翻訳して紹介することにしました。↓

After three decades of persecution that virtually eradicated its presence, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood has resurrected itself to become the dominant group in the fragmented opposition movement pursuing a 14-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.・・・ The revival marks an extraordinary comeback for an organization that was almost annihilated after the last revolt in Syria, which ended in the killing by government forces of as many as 25,000 people in the city of Hama in 1982. ・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/syrias-muslim-...

Syrian rebels battling the regime of President Bashar al-Assad have begun receiving significantly more and better weapons in recent weeks, an effort paid for by Persian Gulf nations and coordinated in part by the United States, according to opposition activists and U.S. and foreign officials.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-secur...

A senior Syrian military officer has described how he defected to opposition forces after witnessing hundreds of pro-regime militiamen carry out the now infamous massacre of more than 100 civilians in the town of Houla one week ago.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/02/massac...

・・・With the help of high-priced public relations advisers who had worked in the Clinton, Bush and Thatcher administrations, the president and his family have sought over the past five years to portray themselves in the Western media as accessible, progressive and even glamorous. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/world/middleeast...

The recent massacres may also speak of a more radical despair. They had no military rationale beyond the sectarian cleansing of mixed Alawite and Sunni areas in north-west Syria.・・・ ・・・there have been tell-tale signs the regime was clearing lines of retreat to this region as a fallback position. That helps explain the repeated attempts to subdue the city of Homs, the gateway to the Alawite safe haven.・・・http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/cb17c67c-b4a6-11e1-...

Turkey calls for emergency NATO meeting over Syria downing of jet・・・ Investigations into the shooting suggested that it was not an accident or a mistake, and that Syria was aware it was firing at a Turkish plane when the U.S.-made F-4 fighter was targeted without warning by at least two surface-to-air missiles,・・・ Turkey is hosting the leadership of the rebel Free Syrian Army at a refugee camp in southern Turkey and recently joined in an effort to supply rebels inside Syria with arms and money, in collaboration with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United States. Invoking Article 4 of the NATO charter is not considered as serious a step as Article 5, which requires members to spring to the defense of any ally that is under attack. But the fact that NATO is being drawn into the global debate on how to resolve the Syrian conundrum marks a new phase in an effort that has so far focused on U.N. diplomacy, ・・・ Russia, one of Syria’s staunchest allies, has repeatedly said it would use its veto to prevent any Security Council action that might open the door to military intervention. But Syria has now presented NATO with a pretext for involvement that could potentially bypass the United Nations・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/tu...

＜トルコは、サウディアラビアとカタールがカネを出した武器が（トルコ経由で）シリアの叛徒にわたるのを黙認＋叛徒指導部はトルコのイスタンブールで定期的に会合＋シリア軍の上級将校がこの数カ月、何百人もトルコに亡命＋現在約31,000人のシリア人難民がトルコに在留＝事実上宣戦抜きの戦争がトルコとシリアの間で既に戦われている。↓＞ ・・・The plane shooting came just days after American news reports emerged of Ankara turning a blind eye to arms shipments, allegedly Saudi- and Qatari-funded, being made to Syrian rebels. The Syrian opposition meets regularly in Istanbul, and hundreds of senior military officers have defected there in recent months ― most recently, on Monday, a general, two colonels, two majors, one lieutenant and 33 soldiers. Most pressing, a steady flow of Syrian refugees arrives daily. Some 31,000 Syrians are now housed in five camps in Hatay, a Turkish province on the border.・・・ There is an undeclared, veiled war going on・・・ ＜撃墜されたトルコの戦闘機は、ロシア製のシリアのレーダーの性能を確かめていた可能性がある。↓＞ Some analysts have suggested the plane might have been testing the responsiveness of Russian-supplied Syrian radar that could thwart any foreign intervention, including reconnaissance sorties and efforts to supply Syrian rebels・・・http://world.time.com/2012/06/25/military-interven...

・・・In Ankara, Mr. Erdogan said Turkey had revised its military rules of engagement toward Syria. ＜シリア軍がトルコ国境に接近してきたら、攻撃することあるべしだって。↓＞ “Every military element that approaches the Turkish border from Syria in a manner that constitutes a security risk or danger would be considered as a threat and would be treated as a military target,” he said in a speech to lawmakers attended by Arab diplomats. “From here, we warn the Syrian regime not to make any mistakes, not to test Turkey’s decisiveness and wisdom,” Mr. Erdogan said. “If there is anyone who could not understand this up until today, we would and will prove in the most clear and determined way that Turkey cannot be challenged,” he said.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/27/world/middleeast...

・・・A Gallup survey conducted in April found that Egyptians’ confidence in the military had dropped little since June 2011, from 95 to 89 percent. ・・・survey this spring indicated that three-quarters of Egyptians believe the military has a good influence. Both surveys found that majorities viewed the council of generals positively. ・・・ ＜1973年の対イスラエル戦での「健闘」、警察や治安諸機関に比べて非排他的で腐敗していない、というイメージだと。↓＞ To many Egyptians, the army is a valiant force that faced down Israel in the 1973 conflict known here as the “October War,” which ended in stalemate but led to Egypt’s eventual repossession of the Sinai Peninsula. It is viewed as more inclusive and less brutal and corrupt than the police and security services, whose members often served as henchmen for Mubarak. ・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/de...

A coalition led by a Western-educated political scientist appeared on Sunday to be beating its Islamist rivals in Libya’s first election after Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, breaking an Islamist wave that swept across neighboring Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco in the aftermath of the Arab Spring uprisings.・・・ Repressed with exceptional cruelty by Colonel Qaddafi, Libya’s Islamists never developed the preaching and charitable networks that gave them a leg up over liberals in Tunisia or Egypt, to say nothing of the political expertise.・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/world/africa/lib...

＜彼は出身の市（シリア第７の都市）のバース党の長だったし、イスラエル国境の州の知事をやったこともある。↓＞ ・・・He was the head of the Ba'ath party in his home city of Deir ez-Zor, the seventh largest in Syria, as well as serving as governor of the sensitive Quneitra province, along the Israeli border. ＜何よりもかによりも、彼はシリアとイラクにまたがる大部族の長。↓＞ Most importantly, Fares is the Syrian head of the Uqaydat tribe which straddles the Syrian-Iraqi border along the Euphrates river. They and other border tribes have long been a powerful force in the region's history and some observers see them as the key to Assad's survival.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/11/syria-...

・・・The pro-government Al-Dunia TV station reported that it was a suicide attack. But commanders in the Free Syrian Army, which claimed responsibility, said a bomb had been planted inside the meeting room and was detonated remotely. According Col. Malik Kurdi, spokesman for the Free Syrian Army, the operation had been planned more than two months ago, and rebels seized the opportunity to act following the battles that erupted in the streets of Damascus over the past four days. ・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/ap-syrian-stat...

少なくともアルカーイダ系が決行したんじゃなさそうだ。↓

・・・one of the senior Syrian officials killed in Wednesday’s bombing, Gen. Assef Shawkat, was accused by U.S. officials of playing a central role in the Iraq war by shuttling foreign fighters allied with al-Qaeda into the country to battle U.S. forces.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-secur...

・・・the Houla Massacre・・・on the afternoon of May 25・・・ 700 members of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) had come to Houla from various towns to kill families that had converted to the Alawite or Shiite faiths and had not joined the rebellion.・・・http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/a-look-b...

・・・Bashar al-Assad's military machine is on the brink of logistical meltdown and collapse, because it lacks petrol and food, and is having problems resupplying its soldiers, ・・・ ＜これは、反体制側が田舎を支配し、都市に拠る体制側を包囲しているから。↓＞ Over the past few months the Free Syrian Army (FSA) has taken control of large swaths of the countryside, carving out a mini-empire in the north and east. The regime is largely confined to urban areas. This new geographical reality has given opposition fighters the capacity to degrade the military's creaking supply chain. ・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/27/syrian...

Syrian rebels are brimming with self-confidence these days. Just 40 kilometers from the embattled city of Aleppo, they have already raised their flag. In their eyes, dictator Bashar Assad's Syria no longer exists, and they are already beginning to set up their own country.・・・http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/rebels-i...

・・・There is a special training programme based in Turkey at secret camps run by the Turkish military・・・ Qatar and Saudi Arabia are also reported to be providing assistance for what has been described as a secret nerve centre for military aid and communications for the Syrian rebels. This is reported to have been set up in Adana＜（＝シリアとの国境に近いトルコの港町）http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adana＞・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-191248...

The SNC and other opposition members hailed the action, welcoming the highest-ranking civilian defector in the 17-month crisis. While that designation may be technically true, it’s unlikely to markedly alter events on the ground. Syrian Prime Ministers -- and Cabinet ministers in general -- do not wield any sort of real power in a decades-old system that is basically the Assad family business.・・・ The defection is, however, hugely symbolic: a humiliation to Assad, and another brushstroke filling out the picture of a decrepit regime・・・http://world.time.com/2012/08/06/syrias-prime-mini...

・・・one decisive factor has been improvements by the FSA's fighters in using what weapons are easily available to them, captured or bought from the army, and improvements in the quality of their leadership despite continued heavy losses among leaders.・・・ The result・・・is that the regime is taking ever higher numbers of casualties・・・ ＜ただし、依然として、反体制派の武器は、ほとんどシリア国内で「調達」されたものだって。↓＞ What is counterintuitive -- despite all the talk of weapons deliveries for the FSA paid for by Gulf allies such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar and talk of US and Turkish intelligence and co-ordination assistance -- is how little hard evidence there is so far of large amounts of weapons being delivered from outside. ・・・ The growing effectiveness of the FSA has been fuelled by a number of factors that are likely to be increasingly important even if the rebels lose the current battle for Aleppo. ＜上述の「解放区」等、田舎の大きな部分が反体制派の手に落ちているため、反体制派が武器や兵員を移動させることは容易になってきている一方、体制派がそうするのは困難になってきている。↓＞ As the Assad regime has lost control of more of the rural areas, the opposition has found it easier to move men and arms, while denying the same ability to the regime.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/09/syria-...

＜シリアの反体制派の多くはイスラム（スンニ）原理主義者だが、そのうちアルカーイダ系はほんの一部。↓＞ ・・・The Syrian people in the majority will not become the Taliban,” he says. “There are worries, but al-Qaeda is a fringe element. The Salafis and the Muslim Brotherhood will be big players, but they could be part of parliament. We might not like them, but they are not crazed individuals, and they are not al-Qaeda.http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/sy... （ファイナンシャルタイムスから転載）

The United States and Turkey are considering imposing no-fly zones and other steps on Syria to help rebel forces, Hillary Clinton has announced.・・・ ・・・while Turkish media reported that they were also considering creating safe havens within Syria.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/11/syria-...

Former Syrian PM Riad Hijab, who defected to Jordan last week, has said the Syrian government is collapsing "morally, financially and militarily".Speaking in the Jordanian capital, Amman, he said the regime controlled no more than 30% of Syrian territory.・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-192540...

・・・Mixing arms captured from their enemies with arms smuggled across borders, and adding in weapons that the rebels’ supporters have made in a constellation of hidden shops, Syria’s guerrilla brigades have managed to drive the conventionally equipped Syrian armed forces from areas of the northern countryside and, in certain areas, to put the government to siege. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/29/world/middleeast...

・・・The fight for Syria has become a struggle for the destiny of the region. It is also now a clash of ideologies and orders, of sects and societies. The battle for regional influence runs straight through Damascus and none of the region's main players are willing to yield ground. "It's Sunni versus Shia, Arab versus Persian, America versus Russia, the list goes on," says a western diplomat. "This is unfinished business on many levels."・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/29/syria-...

Iran has resumed shipping military equipment to Syria over Iraqi airspace in a new effort to bolster the embattled government of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, according to senior American officials. ・・・ The flights started up again in July and, to the frustration of American officials, have continued ever since. ・・・ At the time the flights were suspended, Iraq was preparing to host the Arab League summit meeting, which brought to Baghdad many leaders opposed to Mr. Assad. Immediately after the meeting, President Obama, in an April 3 call to Mr. Maliki, reinforced the message that the flights should not continue. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/05/world/middleeast...

・・・If the reaction was generically Muslim in nature, Saudi Arabia, the most notable bastion of Sunni orthodoxy vehemently opposed to any depictions of Muhammad, would be the place where the trailer and the film would be expected to first spark controversy. Yet it wasn't a flash point. Nor have we heard a peep of protest from Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Oman or Kuwait, Persian Gulf countries with relatively strong central governments that retained a firm grip on power during the Arab Spring. As the exuberant democracy movements and revolutions in Libya and Egypt transition to the painstaking reality of establishing law and order・・・http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-...

＜エジプトのモルシ大統領は、9.11同時多発テロは米国の自作自演だと主張しており、また、米国の女性は乱交しているので子供の父親が誰かが分からない、という話を繰り返ししているし、NYの世界貿易センタービルを爆破しようとした犯人を釈放させるために努力すると話しているってさ。↓＞ ・・・President Morsi has famously been known to intimate that 9/11 was an inside job・・・Morsi’s 9/11 “trutherism” is just one of many manifestations of his crankiness about the United States. Back in 2005, when Morsi was running for re-election to parliament・・・I often heard him talk about how American women routinely don’t know who their babies’ fathers are, and how hospitals have accommodated this sad fact of American life by simply registering newborns under their mothers’ names. ・・・ according to a writer for Foreign Policy, Morsi was still saying the same thing in 2011. When Morsi became president, he used the occasion of his first big public address to promise to work for the release of a man convicted of trying to blow up the World Trade Center. ・・・ ＜暴動の背後には政治勢力がある。容疑者第一は、イスラム同朋会を追い落とそうとしている他のイスラム原理主義勢力、第二は、モルシ大統領が暴動を扇動している、或いはその逆に米国に宥和的だとして、同大統領を失脚させようと図る世俗派だってわけ。中共とは違ってエジプトの内部情報は若干は透明性が高いはずだが、単なる推測にとどまってるという点でも中共のケースと同じだねえ。↓＞ Though the protests have been portrayed as spontaneous expressions of civilizational anguish, they are--as almost all protests are―actually organized by political actors with agendas to advance. Though it’s not clear yet who choreographed the current moment of excitement, there are lots of people who stand to benefit from it. First, and most obviously, are other Islamists who wish to usurp the Brotherhood’s throne as the principal defender of Islam. Staging protests against the United States isn’t just a way of casting stones at the Great Satan, it’s also a way of showing up the Brotherhood, of saying that the group is too weak or corrupted by power to do anything to protect Islam’s honor. Secular groups, too, can make political hay out of these protests. After all, the demonstrations put Morsi (and by extension, the Brotherhood) in a pickle. If he seems to be feeding the frenzy, then he can be painted by his opponents as a reckless provocateur who courts the wrath of the world’s sole superpower. If he condemns the protests, he can be portrayed as a hypocrite who talks tough about the West but in reality is willing to make himself its lackey in order to hang onto power. ＜それでもなお、米国がエジプトとの関係を維持したいというのなら、米国はひたすら大人の態度で本件に対応して行くしかないってさ。これも日本にあてはまるな。 ジャリ（韓国民の多くもそうだな）ばかりの環境で大人が生きて行くことのむつかしさよ！↓＞ What all of this suggests is that if the Egyptian-American relationship is to survive, the United States is going to have to continue playing the role of the adult for the time being, because Morsi can’t. ・・・http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fo...

Turkey's parliament has given legal authority to the military to launch cross-border raids into Syria in response to Wednesday's deadly mortar strikes that killed five civilians and edged the two former allies closer to a big conflict. The vote to allow the military to cross into Syria at any point over the next year・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/04/turkis...

＜今や、シリアには、イラン、ロシア、サウディアラビア、カタール、米国、そしてトルコが介入してるってこと。↓＞ ・・・Turkey did not have the legal legitimacy to intervene. But now they also realise that everybody is intervening. Iran is intervening by sending military advisors. Russia is intervening by sending weapons on a regular basis. Saudi Arabia and Qatar are intervening by sending money and some weapons. And the United States is intervening by sending communications gear and some weapons and money indirectly. So everyone is interfering, but they talk about no interference, which is cynical …・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/0...

Saudis line up against Syria’s Assad・・・ Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran each claim to be the world’s true center of Islam. Both nations are struggling to expand their influence in a region upended by popular revolts that are shifting governments and long-standing alliances. Assad’s government serves as Tehran’s key pipeline for transferring money and arms to Hezbollah, the Shiite militia in Lebanon. ・・・ ＜King＞ Abdullah became the first Arab leader to publicly rebuke Assad in August 2011・・・ ＜国王は、お友達だった（レバノン首相の）ハリリが（恐らくはシリアの差し金で）殺されて以来、アサドを憎んで来たっちゅうんだが。↓＞ Abdullah’s relations with Assad have been strained at least since the 2005 assassination of Rafiq Hariri, the former prime minister of Lebanon. The Syrian government is widely believed to have been involved. ・・・“Abdullah was extremely close to Hariri,”・・・ ＜サウディアラビアにはシリア人が100万人以上住んでるんだね。↓＞ ・・・more than a million Syrians live in Saudi Arabia.・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/sa...

・・・the simple math of the Syrian civil war is that the rebels attack many points at the same time, while the Syrian military is only able to focus its counterattacks on a few points at any given moment. For the regime, this is a losing proposition in the long run. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/10/15/s...

・・・Most Kurdish factions are not only suspicious of Assad, but also the Free Syrian Army, which they distrust due its historical ties to Turkey. Daham Ali, a member of Derik's Mala Gel council, explains that the Kurds want to be a third power in Syria. "First the state, second the Free Syrian Army, and thirdly the Kurds. We are not with the state or the Free Syrian Army."・・・ the Democratic Union Party (PYD), a Syrian Kurdish party linked to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), the separatist militia which has been fighting an invigorated campaign against Ankara in recent months. ・・・ A large flag above him bears the face of the PKK's incarcerated founder, Abdullah Ocalan, whose image can be seen hanging from the walls of most public buildings・・・ Kurdish Democratic Party. A photograph of・・・Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraqi Kurdistan, sits in pride of place in his living room. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/10/25/t...

＜イスラエルがガザに攻勢をかけてから、既に550発のロケットがガザから発射されている。うち３分の１は、対ミサイルシステムで迎撃された。↓＞ ・・・about 550 rockets had been fired from Gaza since the start of its military offensive against Gaza, called Operation Pillar of Defence, on Wednesday. A third were intercepted by its Iron Dome defence system. ＜同期間に、イスラエルはガザの600目標に空から攻撃をかけた。↓＞ The Israelis hit more than 600 targets in Gaza over the same period.・・・ ＜イスラエルは、前回の2008年のガザへの地上侵攻時を上回る予備役を召集済み。↓＞ ・・・the size of the call up is on a scale comparable to Israel's invasion of Lebanon six years ago, and several times larger than the number of reservists drafted during the last major incursion into Gaza in 2008. Tanks were seen gathering near the Gaza border, and roads in the area were closed to Israeli civilians.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/17/gaza-a...

＜（引用しなかったが、テルアビブに向けたもののほか、）初めて、エルサレムに向けても、ロケットが発射された。↓＞ A rocket fired from Gaza has landed close to Jerusalem・・・ Hamas described the missile as "an improved Qassam" named an M-75・・・ ＜先月は、ロシア製の対空ミサイルもイスラエルのヘリに向けて発射された。↓＞ Last month, a Russian-made Strela anti-aircraft missile was fired for the first time at an Israeli helicopter over Gaza, but missed.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/16/gaza-r...

＜オバマ政権は、双方に抑制を呼び掛けているが、米上下両院は、イスラエル支持議決を行った。↓＞ ・・・both houses of Congress overwhelmingly voted for resolutions in support of Israel's "inherent right to act in self-defence". ・・・ That position was unequivocally backed by the congressional resolutions without the call made by the Obama administration for Israel to show restraint and avoid civilian casualties. ・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/16/us-ful...

＜わずか、３名が死んだだけ。↓＞ ・・・Despite a barrage of more than 800 rockets this week, including several long-range ones targeting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for the first time in decades, only three Israelis have been killed.・・・ Israel's offensive, which so far has killed 53 Palestinians. ・・・ ＜枢要な地点や人口密集地に向けて発射されてなければ、迎撃ミサイルは発射されない。↓＞ If the rocket is headed for an open area, however, no action is taken. ＜迎撃率は約90%！↓＞ Of the more than 750 rockets fired from Gaza since last week, 245 had been intercepted as of last night. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has not published the number of attempted intercepts, so it is impossible to calculate the exact success rate. But Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Oren as well as Israel’s former director of missile defense, Arieh Herzog, have said that the success rate of attempted intercepts is about 90 percent. That is a significant improvement over the 80 percent rate achieved when the system was first deployed in March 2011.・・・http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2012/11...

＜審判の日の到来は（事実上）ユダヤ人殲滅が条件だとハマス憲章に謳われている。↓＞ Hamas's charter includes the aspiration that "The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews)"・・・this aspiration for genocide that is at the root of Hamas activities. This is the primary reason why Hamas, the governing regime in Gaza, will never recognise or accept a peace accord with Israel in any form.・・・ ＜ガザの封鎖は、イスラエルのガザ撤退から２年後に、ハマスが兵器輸入を止めないので実施されたもの。↓＞ ・・・blockade・・・＜was＞ only implemented two years after Israel left Gaza, when it was clear that instead of building a "Singapore of the Middle East", Hamas was interested in importing stockpiles of weapons from places like Iran.・・・ ＜ガザからのロケットは、ガザの人口密集地から発射され、イスラエルの人口密集地に照準を合わせている、という点で二重の国際法違反だ。↓＞ Every rocket from Gaza is a double war crime. First, the rockets are aimed at civilians; second, they are fired from built-up civilian areas,・・・＜a＞nd about 10% of Hamas rockets fired from Gaza don't reach Israel, exploding in Gaza.・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/nov/1...

イスラエルの対ミサイル防衛システムを褒めちぎってる。↓

＜３人の死者は、全て、同システムに一時的に不具合が生じた時のもの。↓＞ ・・・As of Monday, Israel has reported three casualties, all of which occurred during a temporary malfunction in the missile-defense system.・・・ ＜現在、５個システムからなる。一つ一つが半径45マイルをカバー。↓＞ Currently, five Iron Dome systems are deployed in Israel. Most are located in the south, near Gaza, and each operates with a 45-mile radius.・・・ ＜迎撃ミサイルは、一本10万ドルだが、被害を受けた時のことを考えると、（人の死傷を度外視した場合ですら、）コスト的に引き合う、という計算だと。↓＞ ・・・the interceptors cost up to $100,000 each. The cost of rebuilding a neighborhood destroyed by a rocket attack―not to mention people wounded and lives lost―would be far greater than the cost of the interceptor. ・・・http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/ex...

だからと言って、米国が東アジアや欧州で推進している対核ミサイル防衛システムも有効だ、ということにはならないというコラムだ。↓

＜まず、核弾道弾は、飛んでくるスピードが10倍速い。↓＞ ・・・this small battlefield system has been so successful against the relatively slow-moving short-range rockets doesn't mean that larger and much more expensive missile defense systems, such as the planned NATO system, will work against longer-range strategic missiles that move ten times as fast. ＜しかも、迎撃が宇宙空間（真空）で行われるし、核弾頭が積載されている。↓＞ Besides the speed of the quarry, there are two important distinctions between the systems: where the intercepts take place (in the atmosphere for Iron Dome vs. in space for the NATO system), and the nature of threat (conventional battlefield weapons vs. nuclear-tipped deterrent arms). ・・・ ＜真空中で多数のデコイ（おとり）を使われると、それも本体と同じスピードで飛んでくるので、対処しきれない。↓＞ Any decoys would quickly slow down in the atmosphere and be rendered ineffective and so none are used.・・・ ＜しかも、（このデコイ問題を無視したとしても、）８〜９割を迎撃できたとしても、残りだけでも当方が壊滅的被害を受けてしまう。↓＞ The possibility of stopping eight of 10 nuclear warheads, however, is less decisive in altering strategic calculations since even one nuclear explosion will inflict unacceptable devastation. ・・・ ＜仮に100%迎撃できるようになったらなったで、ミサイルでない他のプラットフォーム・・例えば偽装船舶・・に核を載せて対象国の近くに待機させ、短距離飛行させて目標に命中させるようになるだろう。＞ The real danger of a strategic missile defense that works is that it may work to discourage the missiles -- without discouraging the nuclear weapons themselves. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/11/19/r...

＜株を上げたのは仲介に「成功」したエジプト、株を下げたのはウロウロしただけのトルコ。↓＞ ・・・Morsy, whose anti-Zionist credentials are beyond dispute, seems like the diplomatic troubleshooter who can put Egypt back on the map, while Erdogan's Turkey is once again left to be a mere observer of regional events. http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/11/21/o...

この間にも、シリアでは、反体制派の勝利が間近いところまで来た。↓

・・・while all eyes have been on Gaza and Israel this past week, several major diplomatic and military developments have occurred on the Syrian front -- some of which may prove decisive to the end game of a 20-month old crisis. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/11/21/g...

＜イラン製の近距離ミサイルv.イスラエルの対ミサイル・システム。↓＞ ・・・ The exchange was something of a practice run for any future armed confrontation with Iran, featuring improved rockets that can reach Jerusalem and new antimissile systems to counter them.・・・ ＜イスラエルは、88%の要撃に成功した。↓＞ ＜Israel's＞ antimissile system shot down 88 percent of all assigned targets. ・・・http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/23/world/middleeast...

Israel's David's Sling defense system has successfully intercepted a mid-range missile test-fired over the last few days, in its first trial run of the kind. ・・・ the David's Sling system being used in defense of mid and long-range rockets, with capabilities between that of the Iron Dome -- which can intercept missiles up to 75 kilometers -- and the Arrow, which will be used to intercept long-range exo-atmospheric ballistic missiles. The David's Sling is being jointly developed by the Israeli defense contractor Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and the American defense contractor Raytheon. ・・・http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/isra...

＜その結果、例えば、国際刑事裁判所を利用可能となる。↓＞ ・・・The particular marker of sovereignty it sought from the U.N. is even more bureaucratic: access to international organizations, especially the International Criminal Court at the Hague. ・・・ ＜同裁判所は、これまでヨルダン川西岸におけるイスラエル人の入植は戦争犯罪であるとの認識を示してきた。↓＞ The ICC, as it’s known, is on record as inclined to regard Israel’s more than 100 residential settlements on the West Bank as a crime of war. (The Jewish state pulled its settlers and soldiers out of Gaza in 2005 and argues that it no longer qualifies as its “occupier” under international law. Critics argue otherwise.) The physical presence of the settlements in other words would give Palestine a ready-made case to drag Israel before the court ― or to threaten dragging it before the court. ＜アッバス議長は、西岸のイスラエル人入植者による暴力行為についても問題にしてきた。↓＞ In the dynamics of the Israel-Palestine conflict, the real power lies in the threat. But in his last U.N. address, in September, Palestinian National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas began to lay the foundation for charges based not on the settlements but on the violent behavior of some individual settlers, who attack Palestinian neighbors and vandalize property and mosques. ＜西岸では、今や、パレスティナ人によるテロの時代は過ぎ、イスラエル人によるテロの時代になっているらしい。↓＞ Settler attacks have skyrocketed in the past two years, according to U.N. monitors, and now account for the majority of the political violence on the West Bank, despite the lingering popular impression of Palestinian terrorism dating back decades. On the West Bank, at least, the reality has changed.・・・http://world.time.com/2012/11/29/why-palestine-wil...

A huge battle, perhaps the decisive one of the Syrian civil war, is about to erupt in Damascus. ・・・ Bashar al-Assad has ringed the city with a force 80,000-strong and is reported by his Russian interlocutors to have lost all hope of either victory or escape. His officer corps remains solid and loyal. Only 4,000 of the 27,000 officers in the loyalist force are Sunni, and of those about 1,800 have defected. About 22,000 officers are Alawite, and the number of defections from those ranks is still in single figures. ・・・http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/0...

・・・In the short term, there can and will be at least some consensus. The Brotherhood is constrained not only by an increasingly vocal opposition, but also by external actors. The economy is teetering on the brink and stabilization will only come through the economic support of the United States and Europe. There is only so far Morsi and the Brotherhood can go -- for now. Their focus is on stability, security, and the economy, not on applying Islamic law or creating the mythical Islamic state. ・・・ Islamists have a core constituency that, naturally, wants to see sharia implemented. Democracy does not necessarily moderate such ambitions: According to most polls, the Egyptian public wants to see more Islam and Islamic law in their politics, not less. And then there are the Salafis, the second-largest electoral bloc in the country, who are likely to do whatever they can to drag the Brotherhood -- and everyone else, if possible -- further to the right. ・・・http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/12/04/i...

＜最も、より民主主義的になることが進歩につながると考えている。↓＞ ・・・In the 2010 Gallup survey, more than 80 percent of Egyptians said they agreed with the statement “Moving toward greater democracy will help Muslims progress” ― more than said so in any other Muslim-majority society polled. ＜表現の自由や宗教の自由を最も熱烈に希求している。↓＞ Respondents also largely craved greater social freedoms, such as free speech and religion.・・・ ＜そして、最も自国の社会と経済の将来について楽観的。↓＞ ・・・countries that underwent Arab Spring revolutions were feeling far more optimistic about their social and economic prospects than those that didn’t, and that Egyptians were foremost among them. ・・・http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/...

＜2006年から昨年まで史上最悪の旱魃がシリアを襲った。↓＞ ・・・One of the reasons that so many people decided they were prepared to risk death to oppose President Bashar al-Assad, were the consequences of the worst drought in Syria's recorded history, between 2006 and 2011. ・・・it wiped out the livelihoods of 800,000 people. In north-east Syria, 85% of the livestock died. ＜アサド体制は、不能に補助金をつぎ込み、水を大量に使う綿と小麦の栽培が増えたことが状況を悪化させた。↓＞ The regime made matters worse by subsidising big land owners who intensively farmed thirsty crops like cotton and wheat. North-east Syria is now a stronghold of the rebellion. ・・・http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20659573